Devil's Trade
by procrastinatornow
Summary: Deidara is forced to buy a strange cross from an equally strange girl. What he doesn’t know is the story the cross carries, or the curse. Based on J.R. Young’s Devil’s Trade.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: This is just a random idea I thought I'd try. Based on J.R. Young's Devil's Trade. I highly recommend seeing it, it's an amazing short film.**

Chapter one

Deidara gave an overly dramatic sigh as he sat on the bed of the shitty motel room he and Tobi were using for the night. Most evenings the two missing-nins would campout, but they had been close enough to a small town to stop for the night.

Tobi had made the day's search for the three-tails even more unbearable then it needed to be. Just thinking about the day gave the bomber a headache, too bad he'd run out of Ibuprofen.

"Tobi's going to go take a shower, ok Deidara-sempi?! I feel really dirty." Tobi giggled after stating what he was about to do.

Deidara sighed in annoyance, again. "Tobi…I really don't fuckin care what you're going to do, just shut up and do it, un."

Tobi giggled. "Deidara-sempi just said; 'do it'."

Deidara's eye twitched slightly. "Tobi…get out of my site before I kill you."

Tobi giggled again before nodding, "Ok, Deidara-san." And he then skipped into the bathroom.

Deidara didn't relax until he heard the water of the shower running. "Finally, some quiet, yeah." He muttered laying back, trying to massage away the Tobi-ache.

He took in a deep breath and gave a little smile to the ceiling; he no longer felt a need to drill a hole into his skull.

Not, but two minutes later, did Deidara hear a knock on the room's door, a rather loud knock at that. He groaned, and decided to ignore it.

The person on the other side disagreed with him, though, as the unknown human continued to bang on his door.

Deidara rolled his eyes and sat up, he knew it wasn't someone that figured out he, and Tobi, were Akatsuki. Deidara had made sure that their cloaks were well hidden, and with there being no ninja residing in the tiny town, no one would have a bingo book to identify the two men with.

"What do you want?!" He asked irritably opening the door and looking to see who the person disturbing his peace was.

Standing before him was a young woman, no older looking then 19. She had greasy red hair, red-rimmed brown eyes, and a pale, almost green complexion. She was average in height and weight, and wore nothing, but a black tank top and red shorts.

"Wanna buy my cross?" She asked seriously, looking up at him, holding out a small piece of wood.

"…are you high?" Deidara asked, coming up with no other explanation for the girl's odd look and behavior.

"It'll ruin your life." She added.

Her tone gave Deidara a feeling of uneasiness. He looked her up and down again; she wasn't that bad looking, obviously stoned. Deidara hadn't gotten any in a while, and who would notice the disappearance of a random druggie.

Hell maybe he'd even scare Tobi, that would be a trip, Deidara smirked. "You are high, why don't you come in for a bit?" He reached out and took the girl's arm, the one that wasn't holding the cross.

The girl hit his hand away and fell, dead weight, onto the ground, crying, and staring up at him while still holding the cross out.

Deidara rolled his eyes; the fight wouldn't be worth the fuck. "Fine I'll buy the dammed cross, just stop crying, un." He muttered pulling out a few bills, that were supposed to go to his ibuprofen, and handing them to her.

The girl looked hesitant for a moment, and Deidara was quickly losing patience.

"Just give me the dumb thing." He demanded snatching the small wooden object from her hand and throwing the bills at her, before slamming the door in her face.

The red head stood up shakily and sniffled; she looked around, while hugging herself and slowly made her way back to her own room.

Deidara looked out the window to see if the creepy girl had gone, before looking at his new possession. It was two pieces of rotten and burnt wood, one thick the other rather skinny, tied together by a thin rope that formed a noose knot at the end of it.

"...what a piece of junk…" He muttered turning it over in his hand to examine it. His eyebrows knotted together as he inspected the cross. Something didn't feel right…

"What is that Senpi?"

Deidara jumped, having not noticed Tobi's presences, and turned to glare at the masked-nin.

"This thing, yeah." He muttered holding up the cross for Tobi to see.

The ADD ninja couldn't resist grabbing the new object out of Deidara's hand.

"Ooh! Sempi! Sempi! Where did you get this? It's gross and creepy." Tobi asked.

"Some chick just sold it to me, yeah." Deidara stated, secretly glad to not be holding the weird little cross any more.

"Why'd you buy it, Senpi?" Tobi asked

Deidara glared at Tobi, he didn't really know why he had not just shut the door on the strange girls face. "I wanted to, got a problem with that, hmm?"

"No Sempi, I'm sorry I didn't mean to make you angry!" Tobi stated holding the cross out for Deidara to take back.

The Ex-Iwa ninja gave the wooden cross a look before shaking his head. "Just put it on the bedside table, Tobi, un." He commanded.

Tobi nodded. "Alright, Deidara-sempi." He agreed, setting the cross down and turning back towards Deidara who was still looking at the cross.

"….are you alright Deidara-sempi? You look a little sick." Tobi stated.

Deidara shook his head. "Shut up Tobi, and go to bed. We have to leave early in the morning." He muttered crawling into one of the two ratty beds in the room.

Deidara scowled as he laid down, he had slept on rocks comfier then this thing disguised as a mattress.

"Good night Sempi." Tobi said from the other bed.

"Whatever, yeah." Deidara muttered in response.

Tobi leaned over and turned off the lamp, leaving the two in darkness to try and get some sleep.


	2. Chapter 2

**No reveiws yet...how sad...oh well, I'm still having fun writing this...**

Chapter two

4:00 A.M.

Deidara glared at the red glowing letters on the clock, he would rather be battling an obscene amount of enemies then this:

Stuck in an uncomfortable bed, that smelled horrible, the buzzing sound coming from a light just outside the motel room's door, Tobi's way-too-loud-to-be-natural snoring, and most importantly that creepy as fuck cross he'd been forced to purchase.

'Stupid drugged up slut…' He thought, bitterly, staring at the wooden object.

He couldn't understand why he felt so uneasy with it sitting there, but the red glow from the clock certainly wasn't lowering the creepy factor of the rotten wood.

Deidara turned away from the bedside table to look at the wall, the view wasn't much better. An extremely dirty and faded yellow color, with a multitude of unnamable stains, stared back at him.

Deidara scowled, this sucked. He sat up, the lumpy bed creaking loudly as he did, and looked over at Tobi, who was snoring gleefully; Deidara then looked at the window. The dirty blinds didn't reveal much, but they let in more light then they should.

When Deidara realized he wasn't going to sleep anytime soon, the blonde bomber got out of the uncomfortable bed, and pulled back the blinds. The scenery was less then exciting, especially in the dark. Deidara sighed and continued to look outside.

As he began to get lost in his thoughts, Deidara heard the creaking of a bed, he figured Tobi was getting up to go to the bathroom or get some water.

However, when Deidara didn't hear the sound of the bathroom door opening or closing his gaze shifted to the reflection of the small room, and Deidara felt his heart stop for a minute.

Spinning on the balls of his feet he ran to where Tobi was now hanging from the ceiling.

The masked nin had seemed to have rigged a small noose, attached it to the lighting fixture, and stepped off the bed.

Deidara grabbed Tobi around the legs and tried to shake him loose yelling at the strange man for doing something so stupid.

His attempts were in vain, and Deidara could hear no breathing coming from the hung man. Deidara stood up on the bed and tried to unhook Tobi, only to hear the masked ninja's voice coming from behind him.

"Sempi! What are you doing? Why do you keep yelling?"

Deidara turned his head and saw Tobi laying in the bed he, himself, was standing on.

Deidara turned back to where Tobi had been hanging.

He blinked several times when he saw there was no longer anything there.

Deidara turned back to Tobi. "But you were just…" Deidara couldn't finish his sentence, as his thoughts started to come rushing in, all at once.

"I was just what, Sempi?" Tobi asked, sounding concerned, as he sat up in the rickety, old bed.

"You were just…ne-never mind…go back to bed." Deidara commanded hopping off Tobi's bed and sitting back on his own.

"What's wrong Deidara-senpi?" Tobi asked slowly.

Deidara said nothing, lay back down, faced the wall, and pulled the thin blankets back over him. The ex-Iwa ninja closed his eyes and tried to forget what he had just seen.

Tobi stared at Deidara's back, a feeling of concern settling over him. Madara quickly took over and looked at the small cross sitting on the table next to him. Suspiciously, Madara picked it up; he moved his mask, so he could inspect it better.

Madara scowled at it, if he was right, and he usually was, this was very bad. Quickly the Uchiha put the cross back and slipped the mask over his face.

"Deidara-sempi, Tobi's going to get some ice." He said switching back to Tobi, long enough to tell the bomber why he was leaving.

Deidara didn't respond. Madara was sure the blonde hadn't even heard him.

The elderly Uchiha made his way around the motel hastily, looking for the room of the girl who'd given the cross to Deidara. Tobi had actually seen the whole incident take place, Madara knew he needed to find the teen, and fast.

Madara stopped, when he felt the familiar chakra, a good sign; this meant the young woman was still alive, at least for now.

He knocked on the motel room door and waited for ten seconds before knocking again. As he was about to knock a third time, he felt the chakra signature fading fast.

Madara grabbed the door knob and turned. It didn't move. He muttered a curse and stepped back, gearing up to kick down the door. He moved forward, foot extended, and made solid contact with the wooden door.

Nothing happened.

Madara swore loudly and tried the knob again. The small metal ball still wouldn't budge.

The flustered Uchiha continued to try and open the door, while still keeping tabs on the, nearly gone, chakra signature. He gave the knob another hard turn and pressed his weight against the door, it swung open easily.

The masked Uchiha quickly scanned the room, and seeing no one, he went to the, slightly ajar, bathroom door and looked in.

He no longer felt any chakra coming from the room, and when he looked into the bathtub, he understood why.

The tub had been filled nearly to the top, with water all over the floor and walls, as if there had been a struggle, there was a red tint to the water, and the young woman lay just under the surface. Her eyes were still open, fear and panic frozen in them.

Madara reached into the red water to pull her up, and inspect the body. He felt a deep gash in the back of her head where the blood, which stained the water, was coming from, and saw blood on the tub's faucet. The Uchiha figured she had hit her head while trying to get out of the bath.

There were no bruises from hands on her neck, but there was a bruise that wrapped around the front and sides of the throat and neck.

It was a bruise that could only be made by a rope.

Madara cursed again. He hated being right all the time.


End file.
